Is Phone Jamming Back in Florida?
Volunteers at a campaign office in Dade County, Florida, are reporting suspicious calls that they say resemble the phone jamming scandal of 2002 in New Hampshire.
According to volunteers at the office Sunday night, at about 4 PM the phones started ringing every few seconds. The person on the other line would then ask to speak to "Levi Johnston," Bristol Palin's fiancee, then quickly hang up. After being told by a volunteer that phone jamming was a federal crime, the person on the other end said he was a member of a Republican organization in Minnesota and then hung up.
Shortly afterward, a series of phone calls began coming in from people claiming to represent Obama's campaign in Florida, who, when questioned, delivered a rant about "not being confused by Obama's lies" before hanging up.
Soon others followed "every five seconds", with sounds of a crowded room in the background resembling a call center. These callers also identified themselves as part of Florida Campaign For Change and said they were making calls on behalf of Obama to voters. After a volunteer asked to speak to their supervisor, they were told by a man on the phone that they had been hired by the Florida Democratic Party to call volunteer lists. Suspicious, a volunteer in the office, responding to a call from the "Florida Campaign for Change" asking to speak to "Yolanda," said that Yolanda was out, but that he was an undecided voter and interested in hearing an argument for Obama -- the caller apparently had no script, as volunteers typically do, and could not offer any reasons to support the Democratic nominee, instead saying that he was "only taking a head count." After that exchange, the calls abruptly stopped, a volunteer said.
The total time of the calls was about an hour.
In the past, one dirty trick around election time has been to repeatedly call the same home pretending to be from the opposing candidate's campaign, the goal being to annoy the people to the point that they will not vote for that candidate. It is possible the campaign's office number was on such a list and the calls were meant for voters not for them. Either way, anyone hearing similar stories coming out of campaign offices or voters' homes should report it immediately.
According to volunteers at the office Sunday night, at about 4 PM the phones started ringing every few seconds. The person on the other line would then ask to speak to "Levi Johnston," Bristol Palin's fiancee, then quickly hang up. After being told by a volunteer that phone jamming was a federal crime, the person on the other end said he was a member of a Republican organization in Minnesota and then hung up.
Shortly afterward, a series of phone calls began coming in from people claiming to represent Obama's campaign in Florida, who, when questioned, delivered a rant about "not being confused by Obama's lies" before hanging up.
Soon others followed "every five seconds", with sounds of a crowded room in the background resembling a call center. These callers also identified themselves as part of Florida Campaign For Change and said they were making calls on behalf of Obama to voters. After a volunteer asked to speak to their supervisor, they were told by a man on the phone that they had been hired by the Florida Democratic Party to call volunteer lists. Suspicious, a volunteer in the office, responding to a call from the "Florida Campaign for Change" asking to speak to "Yolanda," said that Yolanda was out, but that he was an undecided voter and interested in hearing an argument for Obama -- the caller apparently had no script, as volunteers typically do, and could not offer any reasons to support the Democratic nominee, instead saying that he was "only taking a head count." After that exchange, the calls abruptly stopped, a volunteer said.
The total time of the calls was about an hour.
In the past, one dirty trick around election time has been to repeatedly call the same home pretending to be from the opposing candidate's campaign, the goal being to annoy the people to the point that they will not vote for that candidate. It is possible the campaign's office number was on such a list and the calls were meant for voters not for them. Either way, anyone hearing similar stories coming out of campaign offices or voters' homes should report it immediately.
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